The Lasso
by tatius
Summary: A confused Wonder Woman is attacked by Thor. But what secrets does she have that he desperately needs? I don't own any of these characters. Marvel and DC do, though. Usually they do a pretty good job with them.
1. Chapter 1

Diana hit the ground with a tremendous thud. Flat on her back, she opened her eyes only to have her vision blurred by the tremendous amounts of rain pouring down. All she could make out was the red light at the top of the Washington Monument, blinking slowly on and off. Then a bolt of lightening flashed across the sky, illuminating the Washington Mall in a flash of otherworldly light for a brief second. That second was all Diana needed to see the figure hurtling towards her from above. She quickly rolled back onto her hands and upper back, pulling her legs and lower torso out of the way of her incoming pursuer. The hammer slammed into the mud and she kicked forward, sending the bottom of her right boot squarely into the bearded jaw of it's wielder, knocking his grip loose. He fell back, away from his weapon, and she leapt into action, using her momentum to spring up, grab him by his cape, and swing him over her head to smack face down into a mess of grass, mud, and gravel. Before he could so much as move, her boot was on his neck, pinning him to the ground.

"You missed," she said, matter-of-factly.

"What?" the blonde sputtered into the mud.

"You didn't punch me through the monument. Villains love doing that. Great way to give a fight some political symbolism," Diana smirked. He had hit hard, but the bantering was coming easier today, so clearly nothing was broken up there.

"Vile enchantress! Do you believe the battle won?"

"Well, seeing as you're facedown in the giant mud puddle that is currently the National Mall, I would consider this a win for me, yes."

"You dare mock Thor, God of Thunder?!" his voiced boomed, seemingly not just from his mouth but from the clouds themselves.

Diana's brow furrowed. "Wait, god of wha—" she began, as her captive flung out his arm to receive his hammer, which had somehow dislodged itself from the muck and flown to its master's grip. In that millisecond that hammer and hand made contact, she felt the surge of electricity coming. She whipped around, bringing her bracelets up to meet the bolt as it lunged towards her. Bolts and static shards screamed off of her enchanted armlets, and she was blown backwards, tumbling head over heals, stopping only when her head slammed into a tree with a resounding crack.

She looked up. Through the storm she seemed to see two Washington Monuments, gliding in and out of each other. And then suddenly, he stood over her, his flowing blonde hair smeared with dirt.

"Now tell me, wench. Where are you keeping Loki?"

to be continued...


	2. Chapter 2

One week earlier

Diana awoke with a start to the sound of her phone vibrating off of her bedside table. Drowsily, she reached over the side of her bed and picked it off the floor.

"Hello?"

"Hi Wonder Woman! I am calling to alert you that we've got a situation near you."

"Mmwhoisthis?" Diana mumbled as she sat up and turned on her bedside lamp. The mess that her room had been when she fell asleep was now tidied, her clothes folded into a neat stack on the chair next her dresser and the trash had been taken out. Bruce might not ever be in bed next to her as she woke up, but he always found a way to remind her that he had been in her arms the night before. If this was his way of trying to avoid a talk about their sixth hookup in one month, then he was sorely mistaken. But the gesture was, as always, much appreciated. Under his rough exterior and playboy swagger he was quite the gentleman.

"This is Stargirl. I'm calling from the JLA Watchtower. Power Girl has assigned me to the alerts this morning as a part of my official League training procedural-"

"Got it, sorry, Stargirl I just didn't recognize your voice calling from this line. You said there was a, uh, situation?"

"Yes! There's been a reading of unstable gamma radiation that's coming from the ScopeX Center in Chinatown. Since that's really near to you, The League was hoping you would be able to check it out, just to make sure everything is ok. Power Girl says that it doesn't look big enough to be Chemo or anyone, but it seems significant."

"Ok, thank you Stargirl. I will check it out. Is Wonder Girl with you?"

"Cleo?" Stargirl's voice perked up, "Um, I mean Wonder Girl is out on a mission with the Teen Titans today. Dealing with a new Brother Blood cult in the Bay Area I think."

"Ok. If you hear from her soon can you tell her to call me?"

"Of course! You can count on me, Wonder Woman!"

"Thank you, Stargirl. Wonder Woman out."

Diana smiled as she put placed her phone down. Stargirl had come a long way in three years. After a brief stint on the Teen Titans she quickly had proven herself to the Justice League as a natural leader and responsible hero, and now that she was 21, only a few years younger than Diana herself, she was more than ready to start the preliminary stages of joining the League. Diana had been a little jealous that Power Girl was chosen as Stargirl's mentor over her, but she would have been lying to herself if she didn't concede that she already had her hands full with Cleo. She couldn't tell why Cleo wasn't answering her calls this time, but she hoped it was a sign that Wonder Girl was at last feeling at home with her fellow Titans. The other option was presumably that Cleo was upset with her. Again. For some unknowable, highly dramatic reason. Diana would complain to her fellow Leaguers about it, but she knew that most of them had it just as bad, if not worse. Superman would never complain openly about anyone, but rumor had it that the newly emerged Superboy was incredibly high-maintenance.

Diana quickly dressed, grabbing her lasso and throwing it into her bag. She wore a coat and scarf over her costume and civilian clothes, since it was supposed to reach the low 40s outside, unusually cold for Washington DC in September. She would have to text Bruce to tell him to make sure that Mr. Freeze was really locked up tight in Arkham. Not that there weren't a couple dozen super villains with cold/weather related powers who could be responsible, but still… once she thought up the right wording she would text him. Send out some feelers as to whether he was in a talking mood or not after last night.

Diana lived in Columbia Heights, and neighborhood in DC that had, until a few years ago, been a nice, affordable place to live in downtown DC, just a few Metro stops away from the National Mall and any other place she could need to go. Now, thanks to the wave of gentrification that had been surging through DC for the past decade, rents were soaring through the roof, driving out many who had lived there their whole lives. Fancy new condos were springing up all over, and a small modern shopping mall now dominated the center of the neighborhood. There was still a good amount of diversity left in the neighborhood, but small businesses were struggling against the massive power of the nationwide chains that had taken up residence in this once very unique neighborhood. Diana was lucky and could still afford the rising prices, but she wondered for how long.

She walked down the steps leading up to the front door of her apartment building and hopped on her bike. Since it was cold out, if would do her body good to get a quick warm up, especially if there was going to be able trouble down in Chinatown. What would have been about a fifteen minute bike ride for an average person she was able to complete in half the time, and after locking up her bike she pulled out her phone to find the exact coordinates of the gamma surge that Stargirl had alerted her to. As of yet she saw no obvious signs of super villain activity, but that was never a guarantee of anything. She walked around the ScopeX Center, where the local basketball and hockey teams played and big blowout concerts were held, and found that the energy signature was in fact coming from a building across the street from the stadium/concert hall.

Diana crossed the street, and looked up at the building that was in potential danger. The bottom two floors were devoted to a theatre, The Whirligig Company Theater, a reputable group that produced mainly classical works, if the blurbs printed on the posters lining the doors were to be believed. Advertisements for their most recent play, Tartuffe, were displayed on the company's electric billboards. This was one of the theaters in DC that was not strapped for cash.

In all the time that Diana had lived in DC she had never seen a show there. The tickets were expensive, but she kept telling herself that she would go if they ever put on any of Aeschylus' works, and that she would have to invite her mother. Thinking about it made Diana smile. Hippolyta was not fond of the ancient Greeks' writings, and even less fond of the idea of leaving Themyscira. When Diana had told her that the world of men still performed the works of Euripides, Sophocles, Aeschylus, and the rest, her mother scoffed. "Is the world of man so utterly bereft of new material that they must rely on those ancient fools?" she had said. Diana couldn't blame her for thinking so. She preferred more intimate theatrical experiences, where you could see the passion and sweat of the performers up close and get wrapped up in the world they were creating around you. As a super hero she could relate better to those actors, rather than those presented to her in a huge, overwhelming space that swallowed them whole and deprived the audience from feeling the energy being created onstage.

"Can I help you?" A man stood in front of her, sticking his head out of one of the glass door entrances to the theater.

"Oh, sorry I was-" she began, snapped back to the matter at hand.

"We're holding auditions at our studio location in Capitol Hill. Even if you leave now I don't think they will be able to see you." The man was in his late 50s as far as Diana could tell, and he looked at up her (he was tall, but Diana was taller) with a mixture of pity, amusement, and overall judgement. He wore a green button-down over his protruding stomach and glasses that sat on the tip of his long nose.

"Sorry, I'm not here to audition. I actually am a reporter from a local newspaper," Diana lied, "We're running a story on the architecture of DC theaters. Do you think I could take a look around?"

"A newspaper? Which one?" the man looked at her confused. "Do you have an appointment?"

"Well, we're more of an online theatre newsblog thing," Diana was not the best of liars and hoped she wasn't blowing it, "We're called the Metropolitan Thespian. I'm surprised you haven't heard of us."

The man stared at her impassively for what felt like probably a week to Diana before sighing and muttering something about there being too many different online publications and told Diana to wait in the lobby while he phoned down someone to give her a quick tour. While he called up to the offices, Diana looked around to see whether there were any signs of trouble. She couldn't imagine that this new-age classical theater would be an ideal super villain hideout, but then again she had seen stranger things. _Plus_, she thought to herself sarcastically, _that guy with the glasses is wearing green and looks to be balding. He might as well be wearing a sign around his neck with 'I'm a burgeoning super villain' written on it. _Diana was laughing to herself about the possibility of the man taking the time to write 'burgeoning' when she was met by a short young woman with bright blue eyes and redish blonde hair.

"Hi, I'm Kris. I'm an intern here and I would love to show you around. And don't worry- I know I look young, but I've been doing a lot of work studying the history of our multiple locations, so I should be able to tell you all you need to know about the architecture of this and any of our other theaters."

"That would be great!" Diana smiled at her, relieved that she would be the one to give her the tour, "I'm Di…" Diana had not considered if it was a good idea to use her alias or not and quietly panicked mid-syllable. She supposed there was no harm in them discovering her ruse after the fact, but at the same time she didn't want to draw any unnecessary attention to herself online or otherwise, plus, it's not as though she had a Facebook or anything but then again she had already started saying Diana and she should probably find a way to finish that name soon before this nice young girl gets scared away and or suspicious about the fact that this so called reporter was standing in front of her mid introduction, spouting "iiiii" for a solid minute so come on just say something, "…ianne." She finished triumphantly. Again, she was not the best liar.

"Dianne?" Kris smiled quizzically up at her.

"Yes, sorry. Dianne. Thank you so much for taking the time out of your day to help me out."

"Please, it's no problem!" Kris chirped while beginning to lead Dianna out of the lobby, "It's a relief to stretch my legs a little."

They walked into the dark of the theater. Except, as Kris paused to turn on the lights, Diana could already see something was wrong.

"Kris, wait—"

"What?" her guide jumped, startled.

"Before you turn on the lights, is the theatre supposed to be glowing blue?" Sure enough, the stage and audience seats were illuminated by a strange blue glow that seemed to be holding the space together. The seams of the space were glowing like a neon sign, and Diana could feel the pulse of some mysterious energy filling the space. But where was the energy going, or coming from?

"Kris, you need to go warn everyone in the building. They need to evacuate right now."

"What's wrong?" Kris' cheerful demeanor had been quickly replaced by a calm but intense concern. She, like Diana, could feel the ground beginning to rumble underneath their feet.

"It's some sort of radiation. Potentially deadly and maybe could collapse the building. You've got to run and get everyone out."

"But what about you?" Kris asked.

"I'm going to call for help," Diana said, reaching into her bag. Kris nodded and ran towards the lobby stairs.

Diana pulled her lasso out and with a flick of her hand it whipped around her. Anyone looking her way would have seen a sudden flash of light as strong as the sun when the lasso encircled her body. Startled, they would have blinked or averted their gaze, and when they looked back, they would have seen Wonder Woman, standing in her fully costumed glory, ready for a fight, with all thoughts of where the other woman who had once been standing in her place had gone suddenly irrelevant. Diana had once asked her mother why a Lasso of Truth carried the potential for such deceitful slight of hand. Hippolyta had told her, "The Lasso aids you in your transformations because it perceives such moments as revealing rather than insincere. It is displaying you as you need to be in that moment. So, in its own way, it is still upholding truth. That it also works a few charms to protect your identity is just a necessary precaution." Diana had taken comfort in her mother's words, but still felt uneasy about her handy tool of justice. If it was willing to bend the truth a little for her, then how could she fully trust it to hold others fully accountable when the time came? Regardless, she couldn't argue about the benefits of having a magic lasso to assist her with her quick changes—all of her clothes had been neatly folded into her bag and placed in limbo somewhere, to be retrieved once she needed them again.

But, regardless, no one was there to see Diana make her transformation. No one was there to see the walls of the theater start to crumble and pull inwards towards a glowing blue sphere that quite suddenly became a gaping rip in space. And, of course, no one was there to see the Frost Giant army emerge from that very same rip. No one, that is, but Wonder Woman.


	3. Chapter 3

The front seats of the theatre were already frozen solid when, a second later, they were smashed into little bits and pieces by the first tremendous blue foot that descended out of the rip in space. It was unlike anything that Diana had ever seen. Wait, no- that's a lie. Diana had seen some pretty weird stuff. Like that time that Brainiac had tried to teleport half of Gotham City into his spaceship and had accidentally replaced it with half of another, far goofier version of Gotham that he had collected in another dimension. Or that time Giganta had stolen Poseidon's trident and tried to turn the Grand Canyon into her own personal hot tub. Speaking of Giganta, there were about six Giganta-sized blue men (giants?) currently making their way towards her, and it looked like there were more on the way. Great. Good. Diana could handle one Giganta, no problemo. Six Gigantas? Suuuuuuuure. Right. Hoo boy.

Diana leapt over the seats in front her (aisles Q-T) and ran down the central aisle towards the closest of the large blue men. As she ran, she adjusted her outfit to its thermal setting, covering her exposed skin, as temperature was rapidly falling. _Rapidly_. It felt like it might be below freezing already. The floor of the theater underneath the very very tall azul-tinted males had turned to ice and they had yet to notice her, with what her size and all. Good. It was a start. She whipped her lasso around the right toe of the nearest one and, using the ice, slid beneath his legs. She looked up to see whether he had felt it. He wasn't looking down, so that was a good sign, but now he was taking a step and thanks to the ice she couldn't ground herself. As she slid along behind him she searched for something to rig the other end of her lasso to, but couldn't see anything that wasn't already covered with ice. Another of the Big Blue Friendly Giant's legs would have to do. Using the momentum from the next step forward, she slid forward and hopped over a smashed section of seats (the former D-F rows) to the neighboring blue guy's left leg, circling around his trunk of an ankle and tying off her lasso.

She then pushed off and slid out directly in front of this new fella and tried to get his attention. She smashed a chunk of frozen seat off and, squinting her eyes to get a good aim, hurled it at the (ok ok Diana would call them Ice Giants) Ice Giant's left eye. Contact. The Ice Giant roared, drew up his ginormous hand to cover his eye, and looked down. Diana smiled and shot him a silent double thumbs-up. Even if the Ice Giant wasn't familiar with the gesture, he got the message. He lunged down towards her, and in the process pulled his companion's leg out from under him. The lasso held strong and Diana slid out of the way as both Ice Giants came tumbling down and into their other companions. But two still stood tall, and were attempting to smash through the ceiling of the theater, which didn't look like it would hold much longer, and the portal still lay open, threatening the possibility of even more Ice Giants arriving soon.

Diana sprung to action, jumping onto the nearest confused Giant's head and running along his body towards one that was struggling to get up. She leapt onto his back, grabbing onto his poorly made tank top or whatever this was that he was using to cover himself and swung herself onto the standing Giant's shoulder. He noticed. Oh wait no, _she_ noticed. Cool. Rad haircut on this female Giant. Anyways, incoming hand attempting to slap her away and all.

"OFF, FILTHY HUMAN!" the Ice Giant roared.

Then Diana, bracing herself, swung her arms out and stopped the hand in its tracks. The Ice Giant furrowed her brows in confusion, attempting to free her hand from Diana's grip. But it was too late. Diana had a firm grasp on it now.

"Not human. Amazon." Diana smiled as she dislocated the Ice Giant's arm from its socket. There was a loud pop and, as the Giant stumbled to the left, Diana ran along her shoulder blade and delivered a punch that shook the building along the Ice Giant's cold cheekbone. The Giant toppled over and Diana rode it down all the way to the ground, hopping off lightly as it hit the ground with a thud.

Alright, just one more and then she had to get that portal closed.

"Hellllpppp!" screamed a male voice. She whipped around. Hadn't the building been cleared? But no, there was a man hanging from the balcony. And the last of the Ice Giants was heading right towards him, dragging his club along the wall of the theater with an ominous low scraping sound. Crap. She reached down to grab her lasso but as she did the man screamed again.

"I- I think I'm slipping." Crapcrapcrapcrapcrap. Diana left the lasso and ran forward, vaulted over the fallen Giants and caught the man midair, twisting her body around to take the impact as she they hit the ground.

"Ow," she grunted as she released the man from her grip, "Are you ok, sir?"

"Ohmygosh. Thank you so much, um… Ms. Umm."

"Wonder Woman. Please, you have to evacuate the building. These creatures are dangerous and this place could be on the verge of collapsing."

"Of course, t-thank you again so so soso much," the man said as he stumbled to steady himself on the ice. He had long, slicked back dark brown hair and was wearing a long, dark coat. And he wore a fedora that… had… stayed… on his head? During that whole thing? Weird. But theater people were eccentric like that, right? Ok anyways he needed to get. out. of. here.

"Sir you need to leave right now!" she screamed and he scrambled towards the exit.

"Are you going to be ok?" he yelled over his shoulder at her as a chunk of the balcony came smashing down in between them.

"Don't worry about me! Just run!" Diana turned around in time to jump out of the way of the club as the remaining Giant slammed it down. She just needed to grab her lasso. Lying on her stomach she slid over to the unconscious Giants and quickly began untying the lasso.

"YOU HAVE DONE WELL, SMALL HUMAN," the giant boomed.

"Thanks, but I didn't really need your approval-" Diana started but it didn't seem like he heard her or cared.

"BUT YOUR WORLD WILL FALL. WE ARE THE FROST GIANTS OF JOTUNHEIM."

Ohhhh. _Frost_ Giants. Not Ice Giants. Ah well. He had tried to get a little monologue started and she had freed her lasso. So it goes.

She whisked her lasso up and around his club and tugged with all of her might.

And watched as her lasso snapped in half with a resounding crack.


	4. Chapter 4

"Wait, explain that again to me."

Bruce was lying next to her in bed, in his underwear, looking up at her quizzically with those dark, brooding eyes of his.

"So, basically, I threw my lasso, which I had just craftily freed, and was going to use it to rip his club away from that Frost Giant, but then, as I said, my lasso snapped. Just like that," she snapped her fingers to emphasize the point, "As if it were any old rope and not, you know, a sacred gift bequeathed upon me by my people and endowed with the sacred power of the Gods." She drew her hands up to her face and let out a sound half way between 'grrraahhhh' and 'bleeegghh.' There were a lot of exasperated h noises in there, is the point.

"Right, but was there anything off about it as far as you could tell in those seconds before? Any other time during the battle?" Diana drew her fingers apart to look at him. Bruce was now propping his head up on his hand, still smiling. His hair was tussled in this way that Diana had not seen before, and it made him look very boyish despite his, y'know, solid abs and pecs and all that.

"No. Not as far as I could tell. Even now, it looks exactly the same as it always has, except split in half," she said, drawing her hands away from her face to gesture over to the lasso, which was now lying on top of her dresser, all broken-like but still glowing its usual golden glow.

"Hm," Bruce shifted to lie on his back, staring up at the ceiling, and was quiet for a little, brooding in that Batman way he was so good at even without his cowl on. His hand lay by her side and, perhaps to reassure her that he was still present with her, he softly traced circles and shapes on her left hip while he thought. It was… nice. Diana liked to think that she had come to know Bruce pretty well over their years fighting side by side and, y'know, during their occasional flings which recently had become a little less occasional and more of a seventh (!) hookup of the month kinda thing, but she still was surprised by his capacity for tenderness. He was a lot more than the privileged asshole that she had taken him for in the early days of the League, when she would make fun of that dumb voice he used back in those days with Black Canary whenever they thought he was out of earshot.

While Bruce did his broody thing, Diana replayed the events of the day over in her head. After her unbreakable Lasso of Truth broke, she had stood, shocked, for a second too long and failed to get out of the way of the oncoming foot of the Ice Giant, and thus was kicked straight through the ceiling. She crashed down across the street from the theater on the roof of the ScopeX Center. Meanwhile the front of the Whirligig Company Theater burst open as her Frost Giant friend broke through towards the street and innocent civilians. She took a breath and stored away the shock of seeing her most trusted tool break for later and took her metaphorical gloves off. It was time to fly.

It was a power of hers that she did not like pulling out except for in the most dire of circumstances. It was not a part of her traditional Amazonian martial training, and thus she had not used it when she won the competition her mother had held for title of Wonder Woman all those years ago. As a result, though she was grateful that the Gods of Olympus had bestowed her with the power, she rarely used it because she never felt that she had earned it in the same way that she had her other powers through years of rigorous training and hard work with her fellow sisters on Themyscira. Plus it tired her out in a major way. After every fight she had ever flown in she had probably slept for about 24 hours straight, which was a risky amount of time to be out of commission for a superhero like herself. But in this case, it was time to end this stupid dumb freakin butt Frosty Giant Man of Dumbness.

She shot forward and caught the Giant right in his stomach, making him grunt in pain and knocking all the air out of him. As he leaned forward into the impact she then rocketed upwards and punched him right in between the eyes. Dazed, he stumbled backwards. Behind him the rip in space was beginning to widen again and Diana could see movement on the other side.

"Ha Ha," she grunted, "No." Using all of her remaining strength, she whizzed around his head, punching him and kicking him at ever angle she could think of. She had successfully pushed him back away from the street and into the ruins of the theater. She flew down to his hand that was holding his stupid club with apparent lasso-snapping powers, hugged his pinky with both of her arms and, digging her feet into the back of his hand, tugged back violently, breaking his finger. As a result, he dropped his dumb club. He also screamed violently in pain. Diana was more focused on the club, but she did enjoy that part too. She dropped down to the ground and grabbed the handle of the club and attempted to lift it. It was very very heavy. She was very very exhausted. But she was also very very done with this crap. She managed to get a grip and began dragging it to her left, picking up speed, and soon thanks to centrifugal force she was twirling it around in a circle, creating a cyclone of wind. At just the right moment, she let go, and the club flew straight through the portal and into whatever other Frost Giant that had just been trying to get through. She looked up at the one still conscious Frost Giant.

"Leave. Now."

"NEVER HUMAN-" the Frost Giant started, still cradling his injured hand, until he was suddenly stopped by the huge flying piece of debris that Diana lobbed up at his face. The Frost Giant fell backwards and landed flat on his back on top of several of his companions, unconscious. He must not have heard that clever "not human- Amazon" quip that she had used earlier, but she hadn't had the energy to repeat herself. It was true that she had managed to whip up the energy to chuck that piece of the ceiling at him, but that was a different kind of effort. She hated having to repeat herself, especially when the timing of that quip had been so perfect earlier. Haha, oh man… that had felt good. Diana stumbled to the right and steadied herself on a broken pillar. Nap time soon— that would be pleasant.

*Wonder Woman, are you all right?* a voice in her head echoed softly. She might have thought she was losing it a little if she didn't recognize the soothing tones of Martian Manhunter's telepathic communications.

"Doing just great, thank you. And how are you?" she replied out loud. She couldn't focus enough to reply solely on his telepathic wavelength right now.

*I am fine, thank you. The Justice League is on the way to help you with containing the portal that let these beings into our world. Up until now they have had their hands full with similar gamma portals that opened in other locations throughout the Earth*

"I figured there must be something up if I had to deal with all that solo. It's ok, J'onn, I got this."

*Wonder Woman, it is of utmost importance that the League come assist you with the clean up. For the incursion that you dealt with has revealed itself as the only true incident. They rest of the League faced mere illusions that faded away as suddenly as they appeared.*

"Oh. That's interesting," Diana suddenly became very aware of the heavy breathing of the unconscious Frost Giants around her. No illusions here, that was for sure, "Any clues as to who's behind it? That level of sorcery seems to indicate one of my baddies."

*Truly. Though the presence of gamma radiation seems to indicate an element of highly advanced technology as well. We will have both Dr. Fate and the Atom runs complete scans of the area*

"Perfect. I'll… just wait here then."

*The Flash will be there in a matter of seconds*

"I'm sure he will. Thank you for the warning, Martian." Martian Manhunter did not reply, but she could feel his knowing smile through the telepathic connection. They both, of course, loved the Flash, but he could be a little… grating at times. Especially when she was feeling this weary. But that J'onn had been considerate enough to jokingly commiserate with her about the oncoming slew of 70 mph jokes and awkward pick up lines had done wonders. She needed a rest, but she could make it through the rest of the day just fine. J'onn was very good at that. A good amount of empathy probably came along with those powers of telepathy of his. It would certainly explain how J'onn, as a former denizen of Mars, often felt like once of the most human members of the team.

In the last quiet moments she had before The Flash arrived, she walked over to where her lasso lay in two pieces. It rested among the rubble of the now basically destroyed balcony, glowing pitifully. She lowered down to her knees and picked it up in her hands. How was she going to explain this to Hippolyta? And also, though perhaps less importantly, how was she going to retrieve her clothes and bag to change out of her costume?

"_woahwoah_Woah, Wonder Woman, I always knew you were a knock out" said a voice zooming in from behind her, "but looks like you laid these guys out _cold_!"

"Hello to you too, Flash."

"Man, and I thought these guys were the _chilly_ ones-"

Wonder Woman stopped replaying the events of the day over in her head before she recalled all the other lame temperature related jokes that the Wally had employed that afternoon. She noted to herself that she really needed to work on her use of tenses in her flashbacks. That had really been all over the place.

The rest of the League had shown up and restrained the Frost Giants, but had been unsuccessful in forcing them back through the unstable portal. Mr. Terrific managed to close it to prevent any further damage to the surrounding area or further invasions, but now they were stuck with six Frost Giants they weren't sure what to do with. They all voted to send them to Mt. Justice, their only headquarters with enough room to hold all six of them securely, though they were not sure just how secure they could keep them. None of the tests that either the Atom or Dr. Fate had run produced conclusive results immediately, so they were all waiting to hear back on any hints of who could be behind the attack. Wonder Woman was, of course, placed in the center of a storm of questions from everyone, which she tried to handle as best as she could, but quite honestly she wasn't sure whether she had seen anything that indicated a master plan or perpetrator.

After all the fuss was over and the damage had been properly assessed Bruce offered her a ride back to her apartment in his Batplane thing, which had more than enough room for both her and her bike. On the way to her apartment she was hit by a third wind and asked whether he was interested in stopping in for a second before the long flight back to Gotham and soon he was in her bed, making out with her, while his Batplane thing was parked in stealth mode on top of the roof of her apartment building. It was nice.

Thinking about the day again left her a little frustrated. All she really had to show for it was her broken lasso. But she supposed the upside there was that she couldn't imagine any of her archenemies staying quiet for long before stepping forward to take credit for such a significant victory. Her villains hated that thing. And she couldn't particularly blame them. One of the strongest commonalities between all the villainous people she had ever fought was an unwillingness to face the truth, and this lasso could draw just about anything from the darkest shadows up into the light. Heck, she was sure that some of the League felt uncomfortable with it, and not just because they all had important secrets of their own, but because they didn't approve of its use morally. Green Arrow was the only one who had brought the ethics of the thing up in conversation, but she was pretty sure that he wasn't the only one who held reservations. But Green Arrow wore a dumb hat, so what did he know? Wait a sec. Hat. Weird hat. When had she had that thought earlier today? Oh right.

"Hera! It was that guy who fell from the balcony," she hissed, her eyes suddenly wide. She whipped around to look at Bruce, "He's behind this. Or connected in some way." Bruce turned to her. She continued, "Right? I mean there was just something off about him. Plus he shouldn't have been there. Plus he _wasn't_ there before. Plus he distracted me RIGHT AS I WAS REACHING FOR MY LASSO OH COME ON." She pushed herself up to sit as the full realization struck her, continuing, "AND HIS STUPID FEDORA STAYED ON HIS HEAD LIKE THERE WAS GLUE THERE OR SOMETHING. But! It must have been some faulty illusion… Because he was wearing himself thin with all of those illusions all over the world… YEAH. THAT ASSHOLE."

Bruce looked at her bemusedly. "I mean, a similar thought did occur to me the minute you mentioned him earlier."

"Oh, ok Mr. World's Greatest Detective," she said as she picked up her pillow and threw it in his face, "Artemis, I just thought he was some theatre eccentric who hadn't been evacuated. But I'm probably right, aren't I?"

"Am I allowed to take this pillow off?" Bruce asked.

"I'll allow it," Diana pushed the pillow off his face and swung her leg over him to straddle him at the waist, "But, c'mon, I just did some pretty neat deductive reasoning right there. You gotta admit it."

"It's a pretty good hypothesis, I will admit it. You've dealt with magic far more than I have so I would say trust your instincts."

Diana smiled, "There's not much that I trust in this world more than my own instincts."

"So what are your instincts telling you right now?" Bruce asked, staring up at her.

"You're about to find out."

And then they kissed and made out a lot again and did other things and a lot happened for the second time that night that they had done differently earlier. It was a good time. Afterwards Diana, feeling very satisfied, basically passed out. It had been a really really long day _and_ she had flown earlier, so, like, it was time for some mega sleepy sleep.

Diana woke up. Morning light was drifting in from the slits of her window shades. She closed her eyes, trying to fall back asleep. But nothing happened. She was wide-awake. What day was it? How long had she slept? She stretched out and her leg touched another leg that wasn't hers right by her side in bed. She started and whipped around and found Bruce. Now rubbing his eyes, having been awoken by her sudden movement.

"Everything ok?" he mumbled.

"What are you still doing here?" Diana almost yelled out of surprise.

"Um… well. I was sleeping?"

"Ok right but you are always out of here before I'm up. And I should've been out for, like 72 hours or something after everything I did… yesterday?" She checked her phone. "YESTERDAY. I flew yesterday and I'm wide-awake! What the hey!"

"If this is no longer about me still being here can I go back to sleep?" Bruce asked into his pillow.

"Sure! Yeah that's fine. I'm going to go for a run! And then I'm going to take a shower! And then I'm going to figure out how to fix my lasso!" Bruce gave her a thumbs up, his head still submerged in his pillow. Diana felt like, she didn't know… a million bucks? Was that still the proper simile in this current economy for feeling better and more energized than she had since she was back on Themyscira training alongside her friends to become the best warrior she could dream of? It would do. It would do just fine. Thanks, million bucks simile, for being such a pal. She threw on some running clothes and before she left her apartment wrote a quick note to Bruce. _Brunch when I get back?_ Washington D.C. was all about brunch places these days. And brunch was a time when _conversations about what a certain amount of hook ups means for two consenting adults ohohoho._ Diana smiled silently to herself, pleased with her evil scheme that she knew wasn't really an evil scheme but was actually a very necessary and healthy thing that was a long time coming. Time to see whether two twenty-something superheroes could have an emotionally intelligent conversation about their needs and desires! Diana still wasn't quite sure what she was going to say. Or even what she was expecting/hoping Bruce would say. Yup this wasn't a bad idea at all!

She headed out and started her familiar route around the neighborhood. The temperature still felt a little colder than usual, but the effects of the arrival of the Frost Giants seemed to be wearing off. At least, she and the rest of the League had assumed after the fact that the drop in temperature had been related to the oncoming attack, and they were usually right about these kinds of things. Not to brag.

She turned onto 14th Street from Oak when the motorcycle pulled up alongside her and slowed to her pace. The rider was wearing a green helmet with a black visor over his face and he raised a hand and waved at her. She slowed to a jog and waved back, her eyebrows raised skeptically. She could not think of anyone she knew who rode a motorcycle. Then he raised his visor.

"Dearest salutations, Ms. Wonder Woman," said the man who had fallen from the balcony, his impish eyes gleaming in the sunlight, "How's life without that troublesome golden twine of yours?"

And before the chapter could end and let that moment be the cliffhanger, Diana yelled, "YOU. DICKFACE." and lunged at him.


End file.
